http://www.excellence-mag.com/issues/184/a...he-strenger-six

Nice story! Steve has great iron!

I need to get to Tampa to see it in person. And the beige example too!

Maybe even hear it run?

John

I knew it was going to happen, but not this soon. And now the Fucher won't take my calls.

Congrats Steve

Great story. As much as I would love to own a car like that, its really meant for a guy like Steve.

Great story and a beautiful car...

Nice going!.....it always go's to their Fuchin heads(too soon)

Congrats Steve. I'd keep ignoring T.C. too if I were you

Just kidding T.C. (post whore)

Talk about obsessive, never give up this is it Congrats Steve. Enjoy the car.

Thanks to all for the positive comments. The excellence photographer spent 7 hours with me taking photos of the car. I can't wait to see all the photos that will be in the article. The article will be in the August Issue (there is no July issue) and it will be on the news stands and in bookstores on June 8th.

Today I sent this note to Bob Chapman who wrote the article and took the photos for excellence.

Bob,
I just saw the article on the excellence website and my wife and I really enjoyed reading it. Thank you very much for writing such a great article about a very special car and at the same time your words will give the reader a good sense of my passion. This is a very exciting time for me. As you know from talking with me, "It's all about the car." I look at my ownership of this car as a responsibility. I am the lucky person that by fate and certainly some perseverance and being at the right place at the right time, (or what I call, "Being in the loop") willingly accepted the responsibility of preserving a piece of 914 history. This article is a significant contribution to the process of keeping special vintage cars like the The Strenger Six, alive and well.

Very nice, bueatiful car. I would love to get my car on the cover of a magazine. that is super cool.

mabey i could get mine on the cover of high times or somthing

Steve,

Congratulations, You are a special 914 person & I am happy for you.

We all owe thanks to Pete Stout for his love of 914's. EXCELLENCE Rocks

Tom

Congrats Steve....you are so deserving.

Steve finally took my call, but his head is the size of Clearwater, as the next time I called, I was screened by his beautiful wife Janie. Screw him, I'd rather talk to her anyway.

Anyway, I know for a fact that this article was a repayment of a favor owed. Did anybody see Godfather? Gaglione? comeon.

I'm just glad I got the important stuff out of the car ( the Factory Date-Stamped Recaros) before the numb-nuts knew what he had.

Come-on, Godiva Chocolates & Poems - to a guy .... from a guy


Anyway I did let it get on my lift once.

T.C.

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Congratulations Steve....

BTW, I have seen, heard, touched the GT and the Beige car and they are SO much more impressive in person.....

-- Rob

All this sweetness is making me ill.....

I am just thrilled that Peter Stout and Excellence finally discovered the Internet.

Rich

About a year ago when I was looking for pictures of cars, to decide on my paint color (originally signal orange), I came across a pic of your car in the drive. It's a rear shot, with a silver car in the front of the drive.

I put that on my desktop and look at it every day. Your car is beautiful! When I win the lotto, I'll have a conversion done to match your great original!

Congratulations!

Great read! Can't wait for the mag to arrive in the mail!

Must be this shot in my driveway

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That's it. Hundreds of people looked at my desktop over this last year wanting to know about the car. Bring it to MUSR!

Got it in the mail today, well before June 8th!

I chatted with Pete and a friend, Ernie at the 914World Limo Build Day about that very subject. I mentioned that a searchable index of past issues would be nice and while I can't say that will happen, Pete did say that they are working hard on the website.

Great article by the way...

such a wonderful car. Well done!

very nice article

can't wait to see the magazine

Sweet!!!

Steve,
I called on the M471 too but was too late,you got it.. Its a real keeper
even with out the original engine the history on it is amazing !!
I own a 70 914-6 with 75K original miles and real clean.The funny
thing is the owner interviewed me too before even looking at the
car.I still own the original 71 914-4 I bought when I was 18 years old
back in 1977,it only has 85k on it.Again congratulations on the
Excellence article...
Take Care,914

Funny thing, it was on Armando's Site for at least a month before it was on PCA.org. Steve is both deligent & Lucky. I guess I have been spoiled, I get to see this car, the Sahara Beige, the World's liteweight Champ, and all my GT parts all the time.

Obviously I was busting on Steve earlier, WE have been friends a long long time.
My only regret is he gave up his 32 year ownership of a Real -6 in order to get this car. Man, you coulda the trifecta, the GT, the Gaglione -6, and the Sahara Beige.

A Good Car, A Great Guy

I lurk on Armando's Site Too.. I saw the Gt to but thought it was one of those
high $$ cars.Never thought it was a M-471 Car.Armando's site is a great
914-6 resource,a lot of pictures..
914

"It didn’t work. The car remained partially disassembled, pushed to the back corner of a warehouse. Gaglione was at wit’s end; three years earlier, he thought he had an agreement to buy it. “I even advertised my 7,000-mile 1985 Carrera and sold it to the first person that called.” A few days later, he was on a plane, cashier’s check in hand to purchase the 914-6 at the agreed price. “I presented the owner with the check only to hear, ‘Steve, I’ve changed my mind. I have decided not to sell the car.’”

Let me guess... the first M471 resides in Novato, right? If so, that guy loves to dick with people.

If so, i've touched it. More than once ...

Andy

There's been so many positive comments about the car, the article and even a few about me, that I feel compelled to thank everyone again. So a big THANK-YOU from the car and from me too!!!!!!!!!

To be honest, the story of my 19 year pursuit could actually be a book. So many things happened during that period that it just couldn't all be told in a magazine article, mostly due to space limitations. Although, I couldn't tell a lot of the story because it would have shown that I was willing to do just about anything to get a factory M471 6 and some of my ideas may have been incriminating. But I think the story still gives a good sense of how focused and persistent I was. It literally consumed my life for most of that period.

I still can't believe my dream came true. I've had at least one 914 in my life every single day since March of 1973 and I can honestly say the passion is stronger today than ever.

Long Live the 914!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Got mine in the mail last night, great read!

One question Steve, was it raining during the photo shoot? Engine bay picture showed water droplets in the bay. Just curious.

Ferg

Ferg,

It's so funny that you ask about the rain issue. Most people that know me well, know that my cars "never" get rained on. My last 914-6 that I owned for 28 years was never driven in the rain. I guess I will never be able to say that about the M471 car.

When Bob Chapman flew into Tampa to take the photo's, the weather that day was very overcast. Not one ray of sunshine the entire day. It was in February and because of the long cold winter we had in Florida, everything was dead and brown. Tampa looked like upstate New York in the winter. We spent 7 hours together taking photographs of the car at various places in Tampa. At the end of the day we were heading to my house and it began to rain. When we got to my driveway and it began to poor. Bob said that he would like to take some photos with the car wet. So the car sat out at the end of my drive way getting soaked as he took some additional photos. I was freaking out but after a week or so I was able to fully recover. Life is good again.

For anyone that doesn't have a subscription to excellence magazine, the August issue should be in the newstands and bookstores on June 8th.

I kinda figured that was the case, I feel the same way BTW, my car got poured on this spring, at a PCA BBQ I took a risk by driving it knowing the weather was iffy and lost. Still have more undercarriage work to do before the Concours next month because of it

Again, very cool article.

Ferg

Hey steve
Beautiful car! I live in Oldsmar and deliver pizzas for the Hungy Howies just around the corner from Mirek's Porsche. Driving past that place has haunted my dreams for years,
Now i have my own 914 and now they'll be haunting my wallet.. lol, their good folks over there. They have a silver 959 in there right now,
Again, amazing car, would love to see it in person someday

Kevin

Automotive photographers love to shoot in wet conditions. The moisture really makes the colors pop and also make the roads, be them asphalt or concrete to be more uniform in color.

Thanks Kevin and welcome to the cult. Mirek likes to use Glasurit paint and that suited me fine. He has done a lot of quality work for many 356 and early 911 cars in the area and I'm very happy with his work.

Got mine last night, awesome car...always did love those stripes!

Random notes:
-The 356 Cab article is a local guy's car...amazing car restoration project.
-Jake Raby's IMS kit for the 996/boxster motors is in the tech article too.

That's exactly what Bob Chapman said when it started to rain. I desperately wanted to put the car in the garage but he was too busy taking photo's.

By the way, there are two vintage photos (from 1972) of the car in the article. It doesn't mention this in the article or the caption but in the black and white photo, the person outside the car leaning over by the driver's window is Erich Strenger. He's talking to his wife Ursula who is sitting in the driver's seat.

A couple of months ago I was contacted by a guy living in the UK. He told me that back in 1972 the Porsche Club of the UK was going on a trip to tour the Porsche factory. He was a graphic artist and decided to contact Erich Strenger (who was Porsche's graphic artist) to see if they could hook up. Graciously Erich agreed to meet him. When they did meet, they really hit it off and Erich invited him back to his house. Later Erich said, I want to show you something in the garage that I recently purchased. It was the M471 GT. The guy took 6 photos of the car and kept them all these years. He emailed me all 6 photos that were taken in May of 1972. FANTASTIC!!!!!!!!!!!

Neat!

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I received my EXCELLENCE magazine today & the (7) page article is better than first mentioned. The opening two page photo is special, paraphrasing my 5-year old granddaughter "it's over the moon"!!!!!

Great compliment to our 914's. My question on the Strenger six???? Why does everyone refer to cars this way When will it be Steve's Six????

Steve, I want to grow up to be just like you.

Tom

Great article... now all that's left to do is have some period correct German Bilstein logos made up in Vinyl for historic car shows!

http://www.flickr.com/photos/lwr/3360336896/

I've got them, but Steve is a Puss, so he'll never put them on. I'm a Man, so they will go on my car

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And, Thomas, there has been a Gaglione -6, it is the car he sold to buy this one

T.C.

Heh Nice! Although I find the German Bilstein logo slightly more appealing; who doesn't love a good Gasdruck Stoss-Dampfer?

I'm really pleased that you enjoyed the article Tom. The article about your car in the August 2002 issue of excellence was done very well too.

Erich Strenger will always be remembered by all the fantastic racing success posters he designed. However during his 38 year career with Porsche he contributed many other great things. He not only designed the Porsche crest (according to his good friend Gerhard Blendstrup) and the P-O-R-S-C-H-E name plate that we all recognize, he was co-founder of Christophorus magazine, and he designed most of the early 356 brochures.

So until anyone can list all the great things I contributed to the marque, I say, "Long live the Strenger six"

I can't see putting the Bilstein and Shell stickers on my car but all the photos I have back to early 1972 show both front quarter panels (above and behind each wheel opening) having a version of the sticker shown on this Strahle GT (see photo below). The sticker that was on my car had "STRAHLE KG" on the top of the triangular sticker. At one point I was considering having a couple of these stickers made.

Glad to see the car profiled, Steve. You've greatly improved my life by helping me when I bought my 74 1.8 liter a few years back, I'm still using "your" wheels... Thanks for everything you've done for the 914!

Paul